Bio-diesel for trains may get green light

CHENNAI: As crude prices skyrocket, an experiment to use bio-diesel in locomotives is entering a crucial stage in Southern Railways' locomotive works plant at Perambur.

The officials at the plant have already successfully carried out trial runs on four motor vehicles and in the coming days, propose to use bio-diesel — derived from used vegetable oil and jatropha curcus, a drought-resistant plant seen in waste lands — on two locomotives.

"The tests have been successful on our motor vehicles. If Indian Railways can use this fuel in all its locomotives, the government can save a whopping Rs 600 crore of foreign exchange per year," said M Jayasingh, chief workshop manager of the Perambur loco works.

The two bio-fuel powered locomotives would start running in the next couple of weeks, he said.

But the availability of the bio-fuel, which is blended with diesel in a ratio of 20:80, is a big problem facing the railways.

A rough estimate indicates that the two locomotives themselves require about 200 litres of the bio-fuel every day.

Railway officials are collecting used vegetables as raw material for bio-fuel from restaurants and hotels, but it isn't enough to meet the anticipated demand.

The Perumbur plant makes the bio-fuel from jatropha and pungum plants. However, the output is much less than the requirement. "Our new and bigger plant will enable us to produce enough fuel to power the two locomotives," Mr Jayasingh said.

He added, however, that the sourcing of raw materials for the bio-diesel extraction plant was not a big problem. "All efforts are being made to plant a maximum number of jatropha plants in vacant lands and alongside railway tracks," he said.

Moreover, the Indian Railways has leased out 5,000 hectares of land to Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) in the western region to plant jatropha trees to establish factors such as yield and availability of oil.

Another supplier can be the department of bio-energy at Tamil Nadu Agriculture University (TNAU) in Coimbatore, which has set up a pilot bio-fuel plant. The plant can supply 250 litres of oil at Rs 20 per litre, according to officials.

The main advantage of using jatropha is that during a preparation process called 'esterification', it generates a by-product, glycerine, that fetches Rs 40 per kg.

A research conducted by the agricultural engineering college and research institute of TNAU showed that 30-35% of oil can be extracted from the jatropha seed.

But the most attractive proposition is the environment-friendly nature of the bio-fuel. "The emission levels of various harmful constituents are 60-100% lower on bio-fuel as compared to petrol or diesel," Mr Jayasingh said.

Activities such as growing the trees, seed collection, oil extraction and processing could generate employment in rural areas, university officials said.

"In our country, there is a large-scale shortage of edible oil and it will be prudent to use edible oils such as pungam and jatropha curcus. These trees can be grown in the backyards of our houses and waste lands such as road hedges," explained Mr Jayasingh.

As far as Indian Railways is concerned, bio-fuel isn't exactly a new experiment. In December '02, the Shatabdi Express between Delhi and Amritsar was run with a bio-diesel-powered locomotive. The bio-diesel supplied by IOC, was, however, a 5% blend.

"The present one will be on a much bigger scale," Southern Railway officials said.

Worldwide, especially in developed countries, bio-fuel is increasingly gaining acceptance. Automobile majors such as BMW, Mercedes Benz, Nissan, Skoda have authorised their vehicles to run on bio-diesel wherever possible.

But, the US and Europe use edible oils such as soyabean, rapeseed and sunflower oil. "This is not possible in india," said the officials.

"Edible oils are costly and for India to attain self-sufficiency in energy requirements, we need to add sufficient bio-fuel plants," they added.